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SPEECH 



MR. J. R. CHANDLER. OF PENN., 



ADMISSION OF CALIFORNIA: 



DELIVERED 



m THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE UNITED STATES, 



MARCH as , 1850 



WASHINGTON: 

GIDEON & CO., PRINTERS. 

1850. 



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SPEECH 



Mr. CHANDLER addressed the Chair as I'ollows : 

Mr. Chairman: The approved method of commencing a speech on the 
ijuestions now before the committee, lias come to be an assurance that the un- 
dertaking is a departure from a fixed resolution, enforced by a sense of duty 
to the orator or his constituents. For myself, sir, I am free to confess, that 
from the day on which the question was committed, I had resolved to offer my 
opinions upon the measure. 

I am satisfied that enough had been said some weeks ago in this House to 
show, not only the general merits of the question now before the committee, 
but also the feelings of sections and individuals on this important subject. 
Having obtained the floor after so much time expended in the effort, [ naturally 
feel that I have reached the field after the battle has been fought, and there- 
fore must content myself with such a use of my position as circumstances will 
allow. 

But, sir, 1 despair of afiracting^ as I feel I cannot reward ., attention. I be- 
lieve that some speakers have distinguished themselves by bold and extrava- 
gant doctrines, much more than they have helped their cause, or assisted the 
country by their advocacy ; and I think it my duty to present moderate views, 
and to advocate them in a moderate tone. I am unable, Mr. Chairman, to 
take sides with those who might represent the old women that ask for a peace- 
ful dissolution of this Union. I feel for the weakness that suggests the appeal, 
and the dependence which might compel its advocacy. I am no less unable 
to approve the calls for disunion which come from the young men, wiio mis- 
take the momentary applause Avhich a surprising act elicits, for the substantial 
fame which finally rewards him who pursues the even tenor of a course that 
insures national peace and national union. 

It is pleasant, undoubtedly, to enjoy tlie ephemeral distinction which ultraism 
earns — to hear the passenger in the street designate the man who had uttered 
the severest thing against the truth, or had most distinguished himself by ap- 
proximation to paradox: 

" It is bravo to be afiniired — to see 
Tho crowd, with pointing ting-cr, cry 'that's he' '" 

I shall not even give expression to my own feelings, unless incidentally, on 
the abstract question of Southern • slavery, nor presume to approach another 
species of bondage in which the mind is sometimes held by that terrible chain, 
a single idea. 

The great difficulty necessarily encountered by those who would obtain the 
floor, causes a delay in prepared remarks, which renders a portion of the ar- 
gument untimely ; and the physical exertions necessary to make one's self 
heard in this Chamber of magnificent reverberation, too often dissipates the 
few ideas that have not become obsolete by delay. I had prepared an argu- 
ment upon the question of admitting California as an inde])endent State, and 
the propriety of allowing the other territorial possessions to remain under the 
present rule ; but so frequently has the ground been trodden since I undertook 
to obtain the floor, and so elaborate have been the arguments, that T shall less 
weary the committee, I am persuaded, by leaving the constitutional question 
'to otiher hands, and taking uj) for consideration some of the remarks which have 



fallen incidentally from the speakers who have preceded me— remarks -which' 
seemed at the time to meet with applause on one side, while they excited as- 
tonishment on the other. I have listened to every speech that has been made 
to this committee on the question before us, and 1 can bear testimony to the 
earnestness and ability which have marked most of the eflbrts on both sides. 
Your own, Mr. Chairman, (Mr. Toombs,) seemed to me to be distinj^uished 
for clear argument and correct deductions, though I might doubt the premises. 
But I hope 1 shall be excused if I say, that the fabric which has been pre- 
sented on the Southern side of the House will not bear close inspection ; the 
material is not what the whole would intimate, and J have drawn a thread here 
and there from web and woof, and purpose to submit each to a minute investi- 
gation. 

The discussion of the question of admitting California has almost natnrallv 
brought up the vexatious question of slavery, and brought out an expression of 
feeling from the North against that institution, and inspired in the South the 
customary laudation, and given rise to lather more than the usual jeremiads 
upon the injuries to which the South has been subjected by the North — wrongs, 
as it is asserted, of an unendurable character and incalculable extent. I was 
struck with the lamentations of the honorable gentleman from North Carolina, 
(Mr. Clingman,) who opened this discussion, and who certainly distinguished 
himself by the freedom of his complaints and the boldness of the remedie.- 
proposed. 

Sir, the honorable gentleman spoke of the decayed commerce of North Caro- 
lina, as if her quays and shores had once bristled with the masts of the naviga- 
tion of the world, and her canvass bellied to every wind that disturbed the 
ocean. I looked up, sir, to see whether Tyre and Venice would not be cited 
as illustrations of the terrible changes in the wasted commerce of that good 
old State, which, according to the idea that the gentleman conveyed, has 
ceased to be "great among nations, and princess among provinces." 

North Carolina, sir, I doubt not, has had changes ; her peculiar position ex- 
poses her to them, and will expose her to them while she depends upon exactly 
the same institution which serves the more Southern States with a different 
climate, a ditlerent soil, and a different produce. But, sir, the change of 
which the honorable gentleman complains does not come from any aggressive 
acts of the North. No action oi the North has had any thing to do with her 
situation. It is her own want of action ; or, rather, it 7vns her own want of 
action. The institution which she cherishes with so much affection, and de- 
fends with so much zeal, is proving its own want of adaptation to a large por- 
tion of the State ; and it is only as she is getting clear of the evil that she 
feels a recuperative power. 

The cry of the South, so often and so confidently repeated on this floor, is 
groundless, causeless, sir, entirely ; no wrong has been meditated, none in- 
flicted — none even cited hero, with the single exception of the refu-al or ne- 
glect of some of the free States to provide for a fulfilment of that clause of the 
Constitution of the United States which requires the restoration of fugitive.- 
from labor. That subject has been handled elsewhere with so much ability, 
that it is unnecessary for me to refer to the constitutional argument. While 
it cannot be denied that the restoration of fugitive slaves, fleeing to some of 
the free States, is neither secured nor encouraged by law, it may be allowed 
to me to make a few remarks upon the causes which changed the practice that 
certainly did exist, ai least in Pennsylvania. The demand for the fugitive 
called into action a class of men, who, fortified with a constable's commission, 
made it a matter of special business to defect and restore to slavery the ab- 
sconding servant ; and the law lent its sanction and its aid to the practice. At: 



leiio'th the danger of detertion taught the fugitive caution, and the profes^sional 
'' slave finder" found hi.s occupation less profitable; but, in the meantime, 
his profession must sustain his stomach; he must lean on his trade for support, 
and if he could not catch and restore to his master the fugitive slave, he must 
catch and try to send into slavery the free black ; and this Avas fretjuently at- 
tempted, and was, as is believed, often successful. The solitary hut of the 
neo-ro, on each side of the Delaware, was invaded by the king of the kidnap- 
pers, and a marketable being drawn thence to meet a demand, not from slave- 
holders, but slave-dealers; and whether suspicions did or did not draw the 
felon into respectable private dwellings, he presented himself where there 
were black servants, and boldly dragged them away before some magistrate, 
where there were at hand witnesses enough to swear to the identity of the 
prisoner as some runaway slave. This was not always successful, nor do I 
mean to say that the prisoner was not always a "fugitive from labor;" but the 
course pursued, and the character of those engaged therein, served in a re- 
spectable and philanthropic community to excite the strongest feelings against 
that institution wiiich exposed the blacks to such injury, and left the whites in 
danger of such domiciliary visitations. Is it strange then, sir, that there should 
have gone up to the legislature strong remonstrances against a law that ope- 
rated \o shield one or two of the greatest scoundrels that ever disgraced society, 
while thev were engaged in the most reprehensible conduct that ever disturbed 
a community? Public seniiment. sir, which was fixed agair.st slavery, and 
which had banished it from Pennsylvania, was directed against this evil ; and 
coincident with some of these outrages was, if I mistake not, that didum of 
the Supreme Court of the United States, which put the mark — at least the 
charge — of unconstitutionality upon the State laws providing for the restora- 
tion of fugitive slaves ; and the laws have yielded to public feeling. Honor- 
able gentlemen declare all this to be wrong ; denounce all this as a violation of 
the Constitution, and an outrage upon the South. Will they tell me, sir, how 
they keep in South Carolina that command of the Constitution of the nation 
which is conveyed in the following words: "The citizens of each State shall be 
entitled to ull the privileges and immunilies of citizens in the several States.^" 
This is a part, and an antecedent part, of the same section which the South 
charges the North with violating; and the South knows that it does not allow 
to the citizens of the free States the immunities which they have a riglit to 
demand. This is recrimination, sir, I confess ; but it is just in its application, 
and serves to show at least that public feeling sometimes blinds men to consti- 
tutional light. 

At this moment., sir, the South points to the advantage which the North en- 
joys in her commerce and manufactures. Sir, there has never been any pro- 
hibition of commerce at the South, excepting such as nature gave in the cha- 
racter of the country, and such as convenience introduced and maintained, in 
the condition of her institutions. 

The North was commercial — the wealth of the people was acquired by, and 
vested in, commerce; and in the midst of the activity and enterprise which 
created and kept up a commercial marine unequalled in the history oi liusiness, 
(all circumstances considered,) the legislature of the nation, moved and influ- 
enced by the South, paralyzed the arm of commerce, wasted the wealth of 
the merchant, and made the seaports monuments of the influence of oppressive 
laws. 

What did the North then, sir > Did she add to her lamentations for losses, 
threats of, and movements toward, disunion.? No, sir. She felt that a majori- 
ty had admifustered the Constitution with a most aiftictivc severity — but still 
it was the Constitution. She kissed the rod, and placed the remnant of her 



capital, saved from the wreck of commerce, in manufactures, and used the ar- 
guments of the Southern orators to have their new investment protected. It 
was occasionally protected, and it occasionally llourished. That protection, 
however, was never felt, in any one particular of its etlect, more than in the 
reduction of the prices of its produce, which followed its continuance. Still, 
sir, the protection has been insufficient, because it has been only temporary — 
it has been spasmodic, and yet the South complains of that. 

Why, lAIr. Chairman, while the North came late — nearly thirty years after 
the adoption of the Constitution — to have a small share in protection, and that 
share often rendered more injurious than profitable, by the want of permanen- 
cy; the South, sir, has had her products sustained by a continual, unwavering 
protection from the moment the Constitution was adopted. Yes, sir; rice and 
cotton have had constant, unchangeable, complete, sufficient protection, and 
the producers have enjoyed the advantages of their condition. 

If it should be demanded where and how rice and cotton have been protect- 
ed, I answer, that in almost every article of trade in this country, (slaves, per- 
haps, excepted,) the ingredient which is most costly, and which gives value 
thereto, is labor. Coal and iron feel jthis, and every fabric of the loom and 
produce of the field confesses the truth of the axiom, that it is the amount of 
labor that gives it value. Well, sir, cotton and rice are produced by the labor 
of slaves, and the Constitution of this country has protected that' species of 
labor, so that free labor can enter into no competition with it. The great in- 
gredient, then, of cotton and rice is amply, fully protected by the Constitution: 
and sugar, sir, another produce of the South, has, besides the constitutional 
protection ujjon lia producing power, the additional advantage of import duties 
upon the same product of rival countries. Why should the South complain? 

In the course of this debate, it has been openly asserted that slavery is a 
blessing — a domestic, social, moral, and ])olitical blessing — a bles'^ing to the 
servant as well as the master. I am no abolitionist, no fanatic — have no pre- 
judices beyond a fixed opinion uj^on the subject of slavery; but I hope 1 shall 
not oflend, when I point to the opinion thus uttered, as a painful, mournful 
proof of the evils of that institution. Nothing but its injurious effect could have 
brought the minds of republicans to such a state. 

It was the remark of Mr. Jefferson, sir, I believe, (I have heard it quoted as 
his,) that "so true as there is a God in Heaven, so true will this nation be 
punished for the sin of slavery." And I shall take the liberty of adding, so 
true as there is a God in Heaven — " and th ;t there is, all nature cries atoud, 
through all her work" — so true as there is a God in Heaven, the nation is now 
afflicted, and bein<; punished for slavery — punished, sir, in the consequences. 
What else has alienated the feelings ofthe South from the North? What else 
has brought discord into the councils of the nation I What else has led to the 
feelings manifested, and language used here, indicative of divided interests 
and ho.-tilc resolves? 

It the institution of slavery is really good — socially and politically good — 
why has not some State, that has abolished it within its limits, invited it back? 
None have — not one. Not one could be hired to do it. There has certainly 
been some little ajipearance of affection toward the institution by States, which 
were losing the distinction of slavery; but this is evidently the result of jiride, 
and not of fondness for it. Maryland, for example, has more than once here, 
upon this floor — and her legislature has recently — shown a sensitiveness upon 
the subject, and Maryland is fast becoming a free Slate. This sensitiveness is 
pnde — it must be excused — it will not retard the emancipation, nor keep back 
the exodus of the institution. And Maryland, sir, I venture to say, would not 
have it kept back; she loves to talk of her own constitutional privilege of sla- 



very, but she would not call it back, if it had gone. An honorable member 
from the South recently mentioned to me that, some time since, one of his 
servants — of whom he has a large number — expressed a wish to marry the 
female slave of another planter; the master represented the possibility of the 
departure of the other person, and the consequent rupture of family relations — 
but the black man ventured. A few years after that, the colored husband felt 
that "the course of true love never did run smooth." The owner of his wife 
resolved to move to Mississippi. The husband was afflicted. His master bad-e 
him go and inquire what the owner of the wife would take for the servant, and; 
if the price was fair, he would purchase her. The next day, the liberal master 
asked the slave what was demanded for his wife? 0, replied the husband, he 
asks twice as much as she is worth; let her go, I would not buy her. And sOy 
sir, freed States say of slavery — it costs more than what it is worth — let it go. 

The honorable gentleman from Florida (Mr. Cabell) read to us, some time 
since, a portion of scripture, in which God commanded Hager to return to her 
master's house, "which," said the honorable gentleman, "was a command to 
return into slaveiy;" and of coarse, as is to be inferred, an approval of modern, 
slavery. Sir, it is an axiom of law, that "what proves too much, proves no- 
thing;" and the command ol God, if it expressed approval of the institution of 
modern domestic slavery, expressed equal approval of another domestic insti- 
tution which existed in the family of Abraham, but wliich I am sure the hon- 
orable gentleman does not mean to applaud. 

The honorable gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Hilliard) was carried by his 
fine classical taste and attainment to Athens, for proof of the conservative 
power of slavery, as that State survived all others of ancient Greece, and was 
especially distinguished for her institution of Helotism. And the honorable 
gentleman remarked, that as the traveller approached the shores of the country, 
his eye rested with peculiar gratification upon the tomb of Themistocles, as the 
great object for delightful reminiscence. Did not the classical enthusiasm of 
the honorable gentleman get the better of his republican instincts, when 
the greai object for his admiration in that land of fading glories was the tomb 
of the aristocrat, who, unable to submit to the decision of the people, shrunk 
away into suicide.? I will i.ot say that the pecular institutions, among which 
the gentleman was reared, had any influence on his classical taste; but it would, 
seem to me, that the true American would have raked the soil of Athens for 
the ashes of the republican Aristides — the man who not only submitted to the 
will of the majority, right or wrong, but even assisted one of that majority to 
inscribe his (Aristides's) name upon the shell that produced his own ostracism- 

If slavery was the perpetuating power of Athens, the preserving principle, 
then St. Paul was probably greatly mistaken, when, standing on Mars' hill, he 
alluded to the thousand altars on every hand, inscribed to every feeling, pas- 
sion, and attribute that distinguish and disgrace our kind, and which were im- 
puted to the gods of their idolatry. Paul found one dedicated to " the Un- 
known God," and he supposed that He was the God of Heaven, and so an- 
nounced it; but if the surmises of the honorable gentleman are true, that single 
altar must have smoked with incense to the dark spirit of slavery — the only 
protecting and preserving power to which the Athenians had dedicated no spe- 
cial devotion. 

Why, sir, the honorable gentleman might as well have imputed to the pure 
Paganism of the Greeks the perpeluily of that State, and have ascribed the 
honor to Jupiter Olympus, who, with his court, occupied the summit ot the 
neighkiring mountain, or have given credit to the goddess who gave her name 
to the city and the State. Commerce, the arts, and philosophy, preserved 
Athens; but slavery — white slavery — not so injurious to manners as black sla- 



•rery, but far more deleterious to morals — white sla\ery, sir, that placed the 
blandishments of beauty against the weak barriers of philosophy — undermined 
that virtue without which a State cannot endure. It was the consequence of that 
institution that the home virtues perished in Athens; and Pericles, the glory of 
ihe State, sacrificed the duties and comforts of the domestic hearth to the mere- 
tricious charms that weakened the virtue of the purest philosopher, and de- 
stroyed the peace of the loftiest orator. 

Sir, Athens has perished; her glories departed; her temples crumbled to 
ruin; her altars are lost; her means of commerce wasted; her Pyreus is choked 
with her unthroned gods; and all that constituted her beauty and her boast has 
departed; nothing is left but her slavery; that is like some mineral in the hu- 
man frame, which seems for a time to give tone to the system, though it finally 
eats it away, and remains itself alone, a solitary monument of its own power 
to destroy. 

Sir, it is dangerous to appeal to antiquity to sustain modern errors; and my 
honorable friend, when he turned to Athens for support, was like the trem- 
bling and falling Saul, summoning the spirit of the departed Samuel. The 
awful apparition denounces the present as full of wrong, and points it to a 
futurity as full of consequent evils. 

The honorable gentleman from Mississippi, (Mr. McWillie,) some das s 
since, remarked that (ieneral Taylor had, in the last Presidential canvass, been 
advocated at the South as a friend of slavery, and at the North as its decided 
opponent; and my honorable friend from Ohio (Mr. Disney) repeated the 
same charge, with some additional emphasis and circujnstance. These gen- 
tlesnen may have had in mind "the life of General C.'v.ss," with the memo- 
rable shifting pages, which worked praise for him at the South as a friend to 
Southern institutions, and at the North presented him as a friend of freedom. 
Sir, I had a considerable share in the last canvass, and I heard nothing of the 
kind in Pennsylvania — no votes asked for upon the statement that General 
Taylor was an anti-slavery man. General Taylor was voted for by the Whigs 
as a sound Whig. He was voted for by many opponents of slavery, with a 
knowledge that he was a slaveholder, but with a belief that, in all questions of 
■ational policy and constitutional right, he would submit to the votes of a ma- 
jority. He was voted for by many "Friends,''' with a full knowledge that he 
was a warrior in command — a general — but with a full knowledge that he was 
a lover of peace, and perhaps with the consciousness that whoever might be 
electe<l, the successful man would be a captain-general and commander-in- 
chief. This last class of persons do not much follow the suggestions of party 
■len or party presses. They have learned to do or to forbear — 

What conscience dictates to be done, 
Or warns them not to do. » 

Among the evils involved in the discussion in which this committee now is, 
may be noted some remarkable abstractions, one of which I will mention. It 
is asserted in the other end of the Capitol, and argued here, that the clause of 
the Constitution which gives to Congress the power of admitting additional 
States into the Union, does, by its own terms, allow of none but States to be 
admitted, or perhaps organized territories. This is another of those curiosities 
that, by proving too much, prove nothing. Why, -ir, the order to enlist soldiers 
for the army would, with such a strict construction, allow none hut soldiers to 
be enlisted; so of otticers; so of members of Congress — we should be always 
here, until our body became exhausted. Nay, sir, what do we do with the 
injunction to man "to take to himself a wife V You remember the anecdote 
of the youngster, of your own portion of the Union, who received a monition 
from his father, that it wa.s time to be steady, make some money, and take a 



wile. '' Why, sir,*' ^aid he, " 1 Hke the money-making, but whose wife shall 
I take ?'" He was a strict constructionist, sir;' the girls of the South, as my 
honorable friend (Mr Stanley) calls the ladies of North Carolina, would fare 
badly; the girls of the North, sir, not being such close constructionists, might 
do better. Sir, you create a monopoly, and widows would be at a premium 

I am aware, sir, that all this is no argument; but some abstractions, like 
some men — 

Safe from the bar, the pulpit, and the throne — 

Are touched and moved by ridicule alone. 

The honorable gentleman from Maryland (Mr. McLane) took occasion, in 
his zeal for the party, to say that the measure which lies at the foundation of 
all the trou))le which we are now meeting — viz., the admission of Texas — 
was a Democratic, and not a Southern, movement; and I suppose, if we ex- 
amine the proceedings of Congress on that qtiestion, we shall find the names 
of Northern Democrats recorded in its favor. The gentleman alluded to the 
Baltimore Convention for proof; but that convention only shows that the wiley 
South contrived to defeat two Northern candidates, and nominate a Southern 
man. "The South could not have triumphed," it is said, " because Mr. Cal- 
houn had no part in the exertion." Alas, sir, recent events show that that 
distinguished statesman is no longer the South. He has, indeed, long since, 1 
apprehend, ceased to have aspirations for the Presidency; he has learned that 
the distinction which is agreeable to him is more likely to be attained by promi- 
nent opposition than by quiet, temporary office. Like Arius, he prefers the 
rank, the influence, and the lasting fame of a hcresiarch, to the quiet and tem- 
porary honors of the tiari. 

Mr. Chairman, there was not a chestnut in the Texan fire that the South did 
not put into the roast. The hand of the North was undoubtedly employed to 
bring the treasures out. 

Mr. Chairman, gentlemen may treat the question before this House as they 
please; but the fact tlaat it is before the House, and before the Senate, and be- 
fore the nation — nay, sir, that it is before all other business, and delays all 
other business — is sufficient proof of its overshadowing importance. It is the 
question of the session; and I believe that its importance has served to invest 
its solution in mystery. Few, sir, are willing to conceive that a question, in- 
volving the interests of such a vast territory — the peace, and perhaps the 
physical integrity, of the nation — can be settled by a reference to a simple prin- 
ciple, which lies at the foundation of our national Government — at the foundation 
of every State government in the Union — I mean, sir, the inalienable, the in- 
disputable right of the States to make their own municipal laws. The rule 
which was the basis of the Declaration of Independence, and which is the soui 
of the National Constitution, has only to be appealed to, and it settles the vexed 
question upon the grounds which a!l admit, and which has been triumphantly 
cited by each division of the Union, if the term division is admissible in regard 
to our nation. Let us see, sir, how this is to apply to the question before the 
committee. The war, or rather the peace, with Mexico secured to these 
United States the possession of a vast territory, which brought with it the laws 
of the sovereignty for which it had been received — laws which must, by the 
customs of nations, and the decisions of the United States Court, continue to 
be operative until new laws and ordinances shall be extended over them. 

Mr. Chairman, the people of the United States, who flocked to California 
with the tlrst intimation of the discovery of gold, were not men to approve of 
the laws of Mexico; and indeed thore were very few to make known those 
laws there, and fewer to enforce them. Yet those people, emigrants from the 
various States, were imbued with a reverence for laws, and had a full know- 



10 

ledge of the propriety of some machinery of government, by which laws could 
be enacted, or at least respectably administered. As in the newly settled por- 
tion of California the Mexican laws were little known, they sought to take 
measures to secure for themselves the proper operation of the laws of the 
United States. But while they deliberated, the Congress of the Union dis- 
cussed, debated, hesitated, and then failed, to give them what they needed, 
and left them to ask for what they wanted — what they now claim — a State 
government. They have proceeded as other people have proceeded; they 
have deliberately, orderly, and with all republican forms, prepared and adopt- 
ed a constitution fer a sovereign State; they have gone through with political 
organization, and they have sent to this Congress two Senators and two Repre- 
sentatives, to ask us to sanction the evidences of their State sovereignty, and 
to give her Representatives seats in our Halls of national legislation. 

Is the claim of California to a place in this Union to be refused .-' If so, on 
what ground ? Not, of course, on the ground that she is not yet organized, 
and therefore not entitled to admission. I think we have disposed of that 
abstraction. 

We may be told, indeed, that other States have reached the Union through 
territorial purgation, and that California was bound to take the same course 
and submit to the same exacting requisition. Sir, the nation and the gentle- 
men who now oppose the admission of California have not been in the habit of 
considering precedents of such binding power in the admission of States. 
Territories and States had, until Texas came, reached us by the treaty-making 
power; and it was then believed, and is now in some quarters atserted, that it 
is only by the treaty-making power that this nation can acquire contiguous ter- 
ritory. But the annexation of Texas was a legislative movement, which 
remains undisputed, and is likely to be undisturbed, imless Texas herself 
should feel her honor impinged upon by the imputed wrongs to the slave interest, 
and ask for a restoration to independence. She of course will not, like the 
Virginia side of the District of Columbia, seek for retrocession to the parent 
power. 

But gentlemen say that there are other territories acquired. Of course there 
are. But are these territories ready to ask admission, or are the}* yet in a con- 
dition to share with us in national security ? We must remember that the pe- 
culiar circumstances of California in\ited thither thousands and thousands of 
the well-informed people of the United States — a population which, fur activity 
and intelligence, has seldom gone to a new country. Men are there, sir, who 
understand all the requisites of government — instructed in the science of legis- 
lation — in the arts of peace and of war; fresh from the institutions of the eastern 
portion of the Union, (I mean eastern with regard to California,) as yet uncun- 
taminated with injurious association, and ready and anxious to secure to them- 
selves and their descendants the benefit which the people of the Ea.stern States 
enjoy. 

But there are other portions of this newly acquired territory; and because 
the South has slavery, she is dreaming constantly of a balance of j)ower. What 
balance? Is it the business of Congress to strike a balance between slavery 
and freedom? Are we here, as if for no other purpose than to see that freedom 
has no advantages? If slavery recedes, as it has receded from the North, must 
new territories be conquered or purchased to keep up a balance? But I will 
not pursue the question. There are Territories beside California. The slave 
States demand that these shall be admitted now, as Territories, without a pro- 
hibition of slavery. The free States declare that, if they are admitted, slavery 
f*hall be excluded. 

Here is issue made — which party shall triumph? Fanatics at the North have 



11 

said, Let us dissolve the Union, which allows slavery. Fanatics at the South 
have said, Let us dissolve this Union, if it will not extend slavery. And men 
on both sides, whom it will not do to call fanatics, have said. It is better to 
have disunion, peaceable or warlike, than to give up or submit to the cause of 
dissension. 

An honorable gentleman in this House, in sustaining the claims of the South 
to extend slavery into New Mexico, asked, with remarkable emphasis, "Why 
may not the South take thither her chattels, as well as the North? The 
Northern man may take thither," said he, "his horse, his dog, his ass, and his 
machinery. Why may not the Southern man carry thither, also, his horse, 
his dog, his ass, and his slaves?" Mark the enumeration, how it tapers down! 

" Fine by degrees, and beautifully less.'' 

The answer to the question, propounded so emphatically, is the constitutional 
doubt under discussion. But admitting that no such doubt existed — that the 
jnatter was one of propriety — it would seem that there might be propounded 
another question. 

When the Northern man goes into New Mexico, and takes with him his 
horse, dog, ass, and a five hundred man-power machine, and assists to form a 
Slate, why must he, with all these, count but as one man in the representation 
on this floor; while the Southern man, who takes thither his horse, dog, ass, 
and five hundred slaves, is reckoned here as three hundred and one men? 

In this state of things, Mr. Chairman, we now are. Some of the Southern 
States have taken measures preparatory to a conditional dissolution of the 
Union — boldly avowed, and coolly defended; and a few elderly women at the 
North ask for a fulfilment of that purpose, if it can be done peaceably. What 
is the remedy? So true as a territorial government is proposed for New Mexico, 
so true will an attempt be made to apply the proviso — and so true as that pro- 
viso shall be applied, so true will the South be justified in receding. So some 
of the South declare. Can no remedy be found — no proposition be made, 
which both parties can accept, without compromising a principle? It apjjears 
to me, sii', the very principle of Government, which we boast as the distin- 
guishing feature of Federal republicanism, is that upon which we can all rally, 
and which serves as a solution of the difficulty before us — the right of the 
people, viz., to establish their own government. California presents her plan — 
why not accept it? Because it is contended New Mexico is not included. 
Has New Mexico applied? 

"But we wish to have slavery in New Mexico," says the South. Well, 
since the North says she will not consent to slavery in the Territories, and the 
South says she will have slavery in New Mexico, is it not republican — is it not 
a fair compromise — to ask New Mexico what she thinks? 

Close constructionists are always liable to lead their followers into difficulties, 
by creating precedents which it becomes exceedingly painful to adopt. 

Years ago, it was earnestly contended, when Territories acquired importance 
only by the augmentation of population in the portions of the original posses- 
sions, that the authority which the Constitution gives Congress to enact all 
necessary laws for the government of the Territories, extended only to the 
power of giving such minute and local statutes as were indispensable to form 
the nucleus of a social gathering, and not that complete form of government 
which provides for these Territories the appliances, dignities, and conveniences 
that make them nearly equal to sovereign States, and which induced many of 
them to retain their territorial form of government for the sake of receiving na- 
tional appropriations for public buildings, and other general conveniences, until 
they are goaded by party demands or personal pride, to seek their gratification 



12 

in election of two Senators, and to have the votes of an apportioned repre- 
sentation. 

And yet, sir, we have a new Territory under an established form of govern- 
ment, with municipal laws suited to the^genius and habits of the people; and 
we wish to disturb all this, and force upon them a territorial government, before 
we have infused into them the healthful ingredients of our own population, and 
prepared them for what they need, and what we require. 

Admit California, with such institutions as she desires, and wait a year, 
(surely we are not in such hot haste at the South as to refuse that) — wait one 
year or so, and see what New Mexico will ask. Is hers a soil or climate that 
is specially appropiiate to slavery? — then it is probable that she may, as a State, 
desire such an institution. I hope not. If neither climate nor soil is favorable, 
the South will not of course jeo})ard its property by forcing it, for the sake of 
honor y where it can produce no profit. 

Is not this a proper deference to the principles of republicanism — is it not a 
fair compromise of measures, without an impingement upon principles? Why 
not then consent to this? Is it because just such a measure as I have proposed 
to the committee is the plan of the Administration? Must discord be produced 
and disunion threatened, in order to oppose the President and Cabinet? Does 
an opposition, however else discordant, unite to thwart the Administration, and 
build hopes upon the slavery attachment of a few of the parly adherents of the 
President? Let that party, then, which sympathizes wiih the Executive, learn 
wisdom from their opponents, and show that they can rest securely upon the 
principles of our Republican Covcrnment, and sustain their party allegiance 
without a violation of their national attachments. It is a beautiful" illusfration 
of the purity of our party principles, that they conform to the maxima of the 
Constitution, and the Declaration of Independence. 

But disunion is threatened, disunion is feared 

I have not time — I have no inclination — to follow this further. Sir, a war 
for a share of the spoils would be, not an honor, but a shame to the South; it 
would pour upon her the discredit of avarice, and the disgrace of defeat, from 
both of which her good genius should willingly save her. 

I remember few such wars — none that resulted in the benefit of those who 
proclaimed them. Sacred history has one instance — it is that of the attempt 
of the Ephraimites to dissolve the union, because they were not called in to 
what they called their share of the lich spoils of the Ammonitish war. But 
Jephtha dispersed the host; and the borders of the Cumberland may be politi- 
cally as fatal a j)lace to the disunlonists as the passes of Jordan were physically 
to the rebelling Ephraimites. 

What a glorious revenge, Mr. Chairman, would Mexico have for her defeat, 
in such an outbreak as is threatened. She would find in it a consolation for 
her losses in Palo Alto, Buena Vista, Che])ultepcc, and the Halls of Monte- 
zuma themselves. 

Let us thank God, Mr. Chairman, that we have at the head of this (Govern- 
ment — this national Oovernment — the Government of the whole nation — one 
who is skilful in battle against the enemies of his country, wherever found, 
and calm, and wise, and prudent, and conciliatory in his councils. 

Well seems he born to be with honor crowned, 
So well the lore he knows of reqinifiit; 
Peerless in fi^ht — in councils ;^rave and souod ; 
The (ioiil)lc gift of glory exceilr.nl. 

Mr. Chairman, gentlemen have, and, as I think, with great propriety, al- 
luded to the opinions, views, and resolutions of each of their respective States 
and their peculiar di.stricb. This, perhaps, is one of the best means of making 



13 

the cominittee acquainted with the opinions of the people; and as the custom 
IS so honorably sustained, I venture to express my view of the feehngs and 
principles of Pennsylvania, one of whose twenty-four Representatives I have 
the honor to be. I of course must be understood as speaking of my State, not 
for her; that would be a presumption of which 1 am incapable. And I beg at 
the same time to say, that while I speak as a Pennsylvanian, 1 do not forget 
nor disregard the "fact, that I am a national representative and legislator. 
Pennsylvania, sir, has, and manifests a deep interest in the question now be- 
fore the committee, whether we regard the simple proposition to admit Califor- 
nia as a State, or include the dependent, though most prominent que.'tion, of 
slavery- 

As to California, sir, I believe Pennsylvania, who always means right, 
taking the Constitution and the riglits of man as her guide, believes that a 
country thus acquired, thus peopled, and thus demanding admittance into the 
Union,' should be heard, and should have her request granted. 

On the subject of slavery, sir, Pennsylvania has but one opinion. She be- 
lieves it to be injurious and demoralizing. She, as an independent State, dis- 
missed it from her territory, and as a member of the Union, she would willingly 
see it abolished throughout the country. But Pennsylvania contends not 
against the Constitution. She discusses, sir, every public measure with free- 
dom. But when she knows that the organic law of the land 1.- plain, she 
pauses, and with a faitli that does credit to her patriotism, she says: ''The 
Constitution has spoken — the controversy is ended." A love of freedom dis- 
tinguishes the people of that State in an eminent degree. It pervades all the 
institutions of the Commonwealth. It is the instinct of her moral, social, po- 
litical, and religious life. 

Some n^.onths since, when a young member of the present Pennsylvania 
delegation went to take leave of his friend — an ancient relative — that person, 
in bestowing a parting blessing, said: "You will have much before you in Con- 
gress to employ your mind, and one vexed question will present itself for dis- 
cussion. Fanaticism may mystify on one side, and interest conceal truth on 
the other; and you will be, as others have been, perhaps — left in doubt as to 
the course you sliould pursue. In all such instances, be true to yourself, your 
principles, and your State, and give your vote jor Liberty.''^ 

There spoke "Pennsylvania, sir — good, plain old Pennsylvania— frequently 
at fault among the abstraction^- of the South and the philosophy of the North, 
but still right in her instincts — conservative in her action. 

Sir, permit me to say, that while Pennsylvania has no disposition to disturb 
the compromises of the Constitution, or to violate any compact recently made, 
she is steadily, firmly, resolutely tixed in her opinion against the extension of 
slavery over one foot of the Territories yet unoccupied by that institution. It 
does not require a vote of the legislature, nor a meeting of the people, to instruct 
her Representative here. I believe most of her Representatives on this floor 
come imbued with that sentiment. She will abide by the Constitution herself, 
and demand that others shall do the same. 

" But suppose, in the doubtful case of the Territories, where Pennsylvania 
will declare that slavery ought not to go by a vote of Congress, suppose that 
the vote of Congress should send it thither; what woidd then be the action of 
Pennsylvania?" I answer, solemn remonstrance, sir; reproof and dealings 
with those of her own Representatives who should betray her princi])les, but 
respectful submission to that majority whose right it is to rule. 

Mr. Chairman, Pennsylvania is frequently denominated abroad, and has been 
styled on this floor, the "Key-stone State." She deserves that title, as 
much for her service as her position. Wlien the untutored spirits of the North 



14 

or the South have pointed toward a consolidated government, and seemed to 
desire to disturb the substantive position of each portion of the Federal arch, 
then, sir, the strong republican sense of Pennsylvania, her pure patriotism, and 
her just views of the nature of this Government, have made licr, like the key- 
stone of the arch, the point which sustained the pressure and prevented the 
centripetal tendency, and preserved the arch of the Re])ublic. 

But, sir, there is a new state of afHiirs — a new and opposite danger. Now, 
when consolidation is found to beTio longer possible, with such a key-stone in 
the arch, we find a tendency in the spandrels of that arch to settle outward — 
a sort of gentle, peaceful proclivity in the North, and hints of a forceful dismem- 
berment at the South. What is the key-stone to do in this state of affairs? 
Her passiveness, so long eflective, will no longer avail. If the outward tend- 
■ency is persisted in, the central portion must fall, and the key-stone remain 
above the ruins of that arch which it could not save. 

What is Pennsylvania to do, in this state of things? Sir, Pennsylvania re- 
gards disunion as treason; and she knows but one mode of cure for that disor- 
der — a mode that is to be varied only by the number to be dealt with. I may 
not have expressed the opinions of all my colleagues, when I referred to the 
determination of Pennsylvania to agree to'no additional slave Territories; but, 
sir, there is a sentiment in which all Pennsylvania can and do concur; and I 
appeal to my colleagues, on both sides of the House — to Democrats and Whigs 
— to the honorable member who gives his name to the rock of offence in the 
proviso — to all of them — wliether Pennsylvania does not stand pledged, by her 
principles and her conduct, to sustain the Union by whomsoever assailed? I 
appeal to them to say, whether she who is willing to send her sons beyond the 
lines of the State and the nation to meet the British, the Indian, or the Mexi- 
can, to repel aggression, punish injury, or extend our limits — will not be ready 
to do as much to preserve that Union which she has been so ready to extend? 

Honorable gentlemen have talked of regiments to be furnished by their 
States, to defend and preserve the Union. Sir, I have no mission here to 
threaten or to taunt; but I say, sir, Pennsylvania has a right, and she has a 
power to do that work. From the tops of her mountains, from this side and 
beyond the mountains, she will gather her legions for the Union. Nay, sir, 
from beneath her mountains she will call up her swart sons by thousands, and 
with the magic Avand of patriotism she will, if summoned to the work, bring 
forth those who are ready to peril limb and life for the integrity of that Gov- 
ernment, and the freedom of that soil, beneath which they find protection and 
employment. 

I say this in no spirit of hostility or unkindnees; but honorable gentlemen 
have thought it meet to protfer the abilities of their respective States, and 
though Pennsylvania, sir, is not much in the habit of telling what she will do, 
nor of boasting of what she has done, yet the humblest of her Representatives 
may be allowed to say, that in endurance of the will of a majority, or resist- 
ance of the violence of a minority, she will be found faithful to lier position; 
faithful to her lofty mission of union and independence. 

But, sir, Pennsylvania has no idea of having any demand made upon her 
military prowess and munitions to sustain the Union. Even in the present 
unfortimate agitation Pennsylvania sees in herself, and others around her, 
more effective and permanent instruments of good. She has established nu- 
merous relations with her sister States, which give efficacy to her attempts to 
restore harmony. If the North grows sullen, she can warm them with her 
coals; if the tempest of disunion gathers in the South, and "threatens to rend 
freedom's temple asunder," Pennsylvania imitates her own Franklin, and 
extends witii (he hand of truth the instrument of affection toward the storm 



15 

cloud, and conducts thence and diverts froin all the fluid that might have pros- 
trated the pillars of our political fabric. Asking nothing that ought to offend, 
and submitting to all that the Constitution warrants, Pennsylvania feels that 
she has a right to speak and to act, and she points to the social and domestic 
relations of her people with the South; to her constantly augmenting commerce; 
her steamboats that reach the sea ports; and her railroads that will overlap the 
interior of the South: she points to these as a means of union and peace; and 
these — 

like a airland of ttowirs, 



Shall entwiiie all unr States in a band — 
Confirm and confederate our wide-spri-ading powers, 
Our wealth and our wisdom cxpanl. 

One word more, sir, with reference to my immediate district and constitu- 
ency, and their relations with the vexed question before us, and the alterna- 
tive presented by a part of the South. Philadelphia feels her interest identified 
with 'the South, "and she looks, therefore, with earnestness to the action of 
Congress on this matter. She knows how much she risks by disunion, and she 
comprehends the value of the object. 

Never people, Mr. Chairman, had a greater veneration and love for a merely 
earthly object than have the citizens of Philadelphia for the Union — that Union 
which, with the independence and the Constitution of the nation, is said to be 
the country. These are convertible terms, because one cannot exist Vvithout 
the other. These, then, sir, are the savinfc principles of our nation- Shall not 
Philadelphia love them and defend them? Sir, .she is the foster-mother of 
both; the Bethlehem of the nation-saving gift. And will she forget her duties? 
"Can a mother forget her child?" 

Sir, I speak advisedly when I say Philadelphia can know only one country — 
one Constitution. And such people are not likely to be remiss in the duty of 
defending that country and that Constitution against all aggression; and what is 
more, sir, she is as ready and as willing to yield to the feelings and wishes of 
all, within the bounds of principle, to keep alive a spirit of love and a spirit of 
union, by a submission to reasonable sacrifice. 

The honorable gentleman from Massachusetts (JNIr. Winthrop) concluded 
his stirring and eloquent philippic, a few weeks since, with a notice that he 
was speaking for Faneuil Hall— Faneuil Hall, with all its sacred remem- 
brances — "not as she is sometimes, when desecrated by fanatics, but as she is 
when she gives forth the sentiments of her early patriots."' 

May I not be permitted to say, sir, that I 'speak for Independence Hall, 
about which cluster the remembrances of the most glorious events that mark 
the annals of nations. I speak for Independence Hall, as it stands dark amid 
the clustering beauties of modern construction — for Independence Hall, 

■' Grown dim by asfe, yet worshipped in decay.'' 

I speak for Independence Hall, the manger and the cradle of Independence, 
whither the star of liberty guided the wi^se and the good; and they came and 
did reverence. Such as that sanctified place was in 1776, by the virtue of our 
fathers — such as it is now, by the patriotism of their children — such, sir, as it 
ever will be, by the inherited and'cultivated virtues of those who derive their 
political inspiraUon from its historical associations, and have "virtue, Uberty, 
and independence" enough to follow the action, imitate the endurance, and 
maintain the glorious legacy of their fathers. 



W46 




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